I love sharing good places where I've dined at, I love hearing about new places from others, I love making new friends on Instagram and taking this friendship offline... and I even get inspiration on things to cook!
One fine day, Sarah from Sarah Cooks shared her amazing picture of her homemade chicken pie (here and here) which got me salivating and craving for pie. I knew I had to make it too!
In her caption, she shared that it was a Nigel Slater's recipe, so I googled it, and that weekend, headed to the supermarket to pick up all the ingredients I needed.
This recipe is no doubt a keeper and I will definitely be making this again, and again, and again. If you love pie and want something hearty for dinner, I'd say give this recipe a go. ;)
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| My beautiful quilted-pillow pie! |
Nigel Slater's Chicken, Bacon & Leek Pie
Recipe adapted from Food Anthology and modified by The Bakeanista
Ingredients
- 800g chicken thighs on the bone
- an onion, quartered
- 8 peppercorns
- a bay leaf
- a few thyme sprigs
- whole milk, enough to cover
- 30g butter
- 6 rashers smoked streaky bacon
- 2 medium leeks, only white and light green parts
- 3 tablespoons plain flour
- two sheets of puff pastry
- egg wash (a little beaten egg and milk)
- Put the chicken pieces into a large saucepan, together with the half onion, peppercorns and herbs and pour enough milk just to cover the chicken.
- Bring to the boil, then, just when it starts to bubble, lower the heat and leave to simmer, partially covered by a lid for about twenty minutes. Remove the chicken from the poaching liquid, reserving the milk. The poaching milk will smell savory and rich. Once the chicken isn’t too hot, pull off the skin and cut the meat off the bone into small, plump pieces.
- Preheat the oven to 200°C. Slice the bacon into small pieces and the leeks into thin half moons. Make sure you wash those leeks really well so there's no grit between layers.
- Melt the butter in a large saucepan and add the bacon. The bacon should soften without colouring over a moderate to low heat. Add the leeks to the bacon and continue cooking for about fifteen minutes more, until the leeks are totally soft.
- Stir the flour into the leek and bacon, continue cooking for a couple of minutes. Gradually strain in enough of the warm milk to make a thick sauce. (I also added a splash of white wine at this stage.) You don’t want this to be a paste, you want it to be a sauce, albeit a thick sauce. There should be enough ‘give’ in the sauce so that the chicken can be mixed in well and coated properly by the sauce. Season generously with salt and pepper.
- Unroll your first sheet of puff pastry onto a lightly floured surface. Roll it out to about 10.5 x 14.5 inches. You might need to put a little flour on your rolling pin to keep it from sticking. Place it on a baking sheet. Spoon the filling onto the pastry, leaving a wide rim all the way around. Brush the rim with the beaten egg and milk. Roll out the second piece of pastry to the same size as the one before and lower it over the filling. Press and crimp the edges together firmly to seal them. You don’t want the filling to leak so ensure the edges are sealed.
- Brush the pastry all over with the beaten egg wash and bake for 35 minutes or until golden brown. Your kitchen would be smelling absolutely yummy, and there you go, dinner is ready. ;)
One thing to note though, portion size is a tad big - this could feed 6, or 4 big eaters, so if you're only making it for two, I'd suggest cutting up the remaining pie in portion size that you require accordingly, wrap them up in aluminium foil respectively and keep frozen.
I did that with the leftovers we had, and it was easy for me to grab a pack from the freezer after work, and pop it into the oven (still wrapped in the aluminium foil, so that means less cleaning too!) for approximately 20-25 minutes at 180°C, or until thoroughly warm.
